Generally, a memory card is used as an external element, to expand a storage space in a variety of equipment, such as a mobile phone, personal digital assistant (PDA), digital camera, and the like. On the basis of a size and standard thereof, the memory card has been introduced into a variety of forms, such as a secure digital (SD) memory card, multimedia card (MMC), compact flash (CF), memory stick, and the like. In addition, a subscriber identification module (SIM) card serves to store, for example, personal financial payment information, and is utilized as a non-contact type electronic credit card, traffic card, pre-paid card, and the like.
Nowadays, the utilization of the SIM card is gradually increasing, for example, for various functions of mobile phones. In particular, functionality of mobile phones is increasingly diversified. Mobile phones can be used, for example, as payment methods when a credit card is received in a phone body, as well as a player of music and moving images. However, most conventional mobile phones have been mainly fabricated in such a way that a memory card is incorporated therein to achieve a video-on-demand (VOD) or moving picture experts group layer—3 Audio (MP3) player function. This fabrication has a problem of low utilization efficiency of the memory card because it is incorporated within the memory phone and prevents users from being able to expand memory capacity of the mobile phone.
An external memory card has been introduced to solve the above-described problem and a multiplicity of technologies for mounting the memory card in a mobile phone, together with a SIM card, have been developed. FIGS. 5-6 show a conventional mounting socket for a memory card M and a SIM card S installed in a conventional mobile phone P. The mobile phone P includes a memory card socket 100 provided to allow the memory card M to be inserted into or separated from an insertion opening H formed in one side of the mobile phone P. A SIM card mount 200 includes a plurality of SIM card connecting terminals 201 and SIM fixing pieces 202 integrally formed at a surface of the memory card socket 100. The SIM card mount 200 is used to fixedly couple the SIM card S to a rear surface of the mobile phone P in a state wherein a battery B is separated from the rear surface of the mobile phone P, such that the SIM card S is connected with the SIM card connecting terminals 201. The memory card M is inserted into the memory card socket 100 from one side of the memory card socket 100, and the SIM card S is coupled to the exposed rear surface of the mobile phone P such that it is mounted to the SIM card mount 200.
However, the above-described prior art has the following problems. The memory card socket 100, which separates the SIM card S and the memory card M from each other, and the SIM fixing pieces 202 are significantly thick, making application thereof to a slim mobile phone difficult. Furthermore, when applied to the mobile phone P, the memory card socket 100 is the main reason of relatively increasing a thickness of the mobile phone P.